What to eat.

Standing in front of the refridgerator wondering what to eat, a common scene at our house.  "Nothing sounds good."  "Ugh we have nothing to eat!"  A daily battle for me is coming home from work, starving, and staring into the never ending abyss of the fridge.

Last night was a perfect example, I came home from work, was in a new stage of hungry and simply could not find what I wanted to satisfy my insatiable hunger.  So I stood and I stood and I stood.  Finally I settled on some chips and salsa, edamame, and topped it off with a fantastic bowl of Samoa ice cream (heaven).  Last night's experience led me to this blog post, how can we prevent bad food choices when not knowing what we want to eat?  Truly a first world problem.

After careful thought my first piece of advice is don't let yourself get to threat level red with hunger.  This is something I really try to do, however when I am swamped at the end of the day and am trying to actually get out of work on time this can be tough.  I have resorted to storing snacks in every nook and cranny of my day.  I have trail mix bags & granola bars in my car, work bag & desk draw.  It's always a nice little surprise when a friend is in my car and out of no where a trail mix bag falls into their lap.  Always cracks me up even if it will scare the living sh*t out of them!  But when your belly starts to growl you can reach for a little something to help tie you over.  Small meals throughout the day keep our metabolism running, so really its a win, win!

My second thought on this subject is stock the fridge with healthy foods.  If you have a stock pile of healthy options for snacking you don't give yourself the opportunity to choose something that you really should be spitting out.  That heavenly Samoa ice cream would have never happened had I done the grocery shopping.  But to defend my hubby, he was helping out because I have been super busy with life and was unable to do our grocery shopping.  Seriously though, surround yourself with healthy options you like.  I love snacky finger foods, hence the edamame last night.  Some of my favorite snacks are banana with PB & honey, apples (sometimes plain sometimes with a little PB or cheese), chips (whole wheat) & some fresh salsa, avocados with some light balsamic vinegar and the list could go on & on.  If you have poor choices to choose from you have no chance, you will pick a high calorie or high sodium option & that will be that.  But stockpiling that fridge with healthy goods is what sets you up for success!  If healthy is all you have, then healthy is what you'll get!

Next time when you are standing in front of the fridge in a moment of desperation take a look and see what your options are.  If they aren't good for you options, maybe a trip to the store right then would be a better option instead.  Allow yourself to succeed by not getting to a famished level and for those times when its not preventable have the good guys ready in the fridge to satisfy your hunger!